Six months ago, Waymo disclosed it was providing 250,000 robotaxi rides a week across its service areas, an ever-growing list that includes Atlanta, Austin, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and the San Francisco Bay Area.
The Alphabet-owned self-driving company has been coy ever since, simply stating it is providing many hundreds of thousands of weekly rides. Now, we have a firmer grasp on those weekly ride numbers, thanks to a leaked letter from Tiger Global Management to it investors that was first reported by CNBC.
The letter was an appeal for investment into Tiger Global’s next venture capital fund and called out the gains, so far, of its current fund. Those gains rested largely on its investments in hot companies like OpenAI, Databricks, and Waymo. In the letter, Tiger disclosed that Waymo is now providing 450,000 robotaxi rides per week — nearly double the amount it disclosed this spring.
That number will rise as the company continues its aggressive rollout strategy, too. Waymo, which provides commercial robotaxi service in five cities, has announced plans to launch in 12 additional cities in 2026, including Dallas, Denver, Houston, Nashville, and San Diego.
A Waymo spokesperson declined to comment.
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Waymo plans to voluntarily issue a software recall with federal safety regulators related to how its robotaxis operate around school buses, the Alphabet-owned company told TechCrunch.
The voluntary software recall will be filed early next week, according to the company. Waymo said as soon as the issue was identified it updated its software on November 17. The company contends this update has meaningfully improved performance to a level better than human drivers in this important area.
Software recalls have become more common in the age of modern passenger vehicles — and now robotaxis — in which operations are handled by software. These updates, or fixes, are often made prior to the official recall but still carry weight when filed with the federal government.
Waymo’s decision follows increased scrutiny by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and criticism by officials in Atlanta and Austin over how its robotaxis perform around school buses.
NHTSA’s Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) opened its initial investigation into Waymo in October after seeing footage of its autonomous vehicle maneuvering around a stopped school bus — with its stop sign extended and lights flashing — that was unloading kids in Atlanta. In that incident, a Waymo robotaxi crossed perpendicularly in front of the school bus from its right side. The autonomous vehicle then turned left around the front of the bus before traveling down the street.
Other similar incidents popped up in Austin, where the company also operates a robotaxi service with partner Uber. Austin School District officials contend, in a letter available on NHTSA’s website, that at least five of these occurred after Waymo said it updated its software.
The agency sent a letter December 3 to Waymo asking for more information about its self-driving system and operations following reports from the Austin School District that its robotaxis illegally passed school buses 19 times this year. Regulators requested detailed information about its fifth-generation self-driving system and operations.
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“While we are incredibly proud of our strong safety record showing Waymo experiences twelve times fewer injury crashes involving pedestrians than human drivers, holding the highest safety standards means recognizing when our behavior should be better,” Waymo Chief Safety Officer Mauricio Peña said in an emailed statement. “As a result, we have made the decision to file a voluntary software recall with NHTSA related to appropriately slowing and stopping in these scenarios. We will continue analyzing our vehicles’ performance and making necessary fixes as part of our commitment to continuous improvement.”
No injuries occurred related to the vehicle behavior addressed by this recall, according to the company, which has emphasized that safety is its top priority and it will continue to work with NHTSA.
The company says it will continue to investigate, track, and implement more updates as needed.
Waymo made a voluntary software recall earlier this year as well as two in 2024, including one that was issued after a Waymo vehicle in Phoenix, driving without a human safety operator, collided with a telephone pole in an alley during a low-speed pullover maneuver.
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The latest expansion to Grand Theft Auto Online includes robotaxis from a fictional-yet-familiar company dubbed “KnoWay,” whose sole purpose appears to be wreaking havoc.
A trailer released Friday shows KnoWay vans adorned with lidar sensors swerving through city streets, wrecking other cars, and crashing through a billboard for the made up company.
While that’s all far more chaotic and destructive than even some of the worst behavior that Waymo’s robotaxis have been guilty of, the in-game autonomous vehicles nonetheless resemble the company’s earlier-generation Chrysler Pacifica vans. The expansion is called “A Safehouse in the Hills” and is available starting December 10.
It’s not clear if the vans in the trailer have been, in true Grand Theft Auto fashion, hijacked by playable characters, or if they’ve gone rogue. It seems likely it’s the latter, though, as Rockstar Games says players will be encouraged to “stop the development of a mass surveillance network in an all-new action-packed adventure” as part of the DLC. (The trailer also teases a storyline that involves an AI assistant named “Haviland,” so the tech world in general appears to be a part of this particular storyline.)
Waymo has said it will deny government requests for the footage its vehicles capture if those requests are “overly broad and unlawful.” But its robotaxis have nevertheless drawn criticism for being part of a growing surveillance state. That frustration has contributed to the company’s vehicles becoming a target of multiple instances of vandalism. Waymo SUVs have been burned, smashed, and had their tires slashed in different cities over the last few years.
Rockstar is clearly tapping into those same dynamics here, as the tagline for KnoWay’s “autonomous hailing system” in the game is: “We Kno where you’re going.” It’s not hard to imagine some players of the DLC taking some of their frustrations out on the virtual vehicles once the update is released later this month.
Waymo declined to comment.
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At TechCrunch Disrupt in October, Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana spoke out against the vandalism, saying her company was “very focused on working with law enforcement to make sure that we pursue the people who are committing these crimes against our fleet.”
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